"As long as our brain is a mystery, the universe - the reflection
of the structure of the brain - will also be a mystery." -Santiago Ramon y Cajal

How does the brain tell time?

The ability to tell time is among the most important functions the brain performs. Tasks such as, understanding speech, performing the complex movements necessary to catch a prey, and predicting when external events will occur, all rely on the brain’s ability to tell time.

We have hypothesized that timing and temporal processing is such an important computation, that most neural circuits are capable of telling time on the scale of milliseconds and seconds. Our research suggests that how the brain tells time has little to do with how man-made clocks tell time (by counting the ticks of an oscillator), our hypothesis is that the brain tells time through the intrinsic dynamics of neurons and neural circuits.

Our research focuses on how neural circuits learn and perform complex computations--such as telling time and temporal processing. Towards this goal our lab uses electrophysiological, optogenetic, computational, and psychophysical techniques.